How to Remove Static from a Scale
by
It was almost midnight at the end of a very long day and my friend Walter and I were sitting at our benches, half-delirious, joking about protocols to film. As if sent from above, our labmate, whose language would make the father from “A Christmas Story” blush, walked into the room right on cue.
The lab had recently ordered a new static gun, to fix the “broken scale”- so the scale was on our minds. For those who have not yet experienced a weigh paper covered in static in your own lab, I hesitate to show you this protocol- only because I’m denying your labmates a true show… I think the performance accurately captures the feeling of unadulterated rage we’ve all felt towards a scale or other instrument at one time or another. Due to the passing of movie announcer Don Lafontaine, our voiceover options were limited- so we went with the Jigsaw killer from the “Saw” movies…
To prevent tarnishing her professional reputation and melting her grandmother’s ears, we agreed to shoot without revealing her identity. However, just like the witness protection program, if you know her, you’ll recognize her…
